Valid point of view.

Valid but dull.

I used to like the 7th and 9th better, too. I remember the 7th feeling like a real discovery for the young me, I guess because the 3rd, 5th, 6th and 9th were more embedded in the culture so it seemed like you had always known (parts of) them.

The 7th is one of the most exhilarating pieces of all time, I adore it, and the second movement is among the most sublime things Beethoven ever wrote. It's a more straightforward uncomplicated work than the 3rd, whose first movement in particular never makes for entirely comfortable listening (which is one of the things that's so great about it of course).

See, being dull doesn't stop me from chattering. I'd prefer this thread ran like a conversation rather than everyone trying to say something profound.

Just popping in to say that I've managed to listen to this piece a couple of times so far and have enjoyed it, but as a complete neophyte in this field I don't feel that I have a great deal to contribute to the discussion at the moment. But I've found the contributions from Bruno and Andy to be absolutely fascinating, and I'm already looking forward to future study pieces.

As an aside, some idle YouTubing led me to Wagner's Liebestad (here) which I think is just outstandingly brilliant. I think learning about classical music might have to become my project for 2010.

I was considering assigning some Wagner when it's my turn at bat, but the fact is I'm having trouble deciding.

Fwiw I'd be at least as interested in the impressions of neophytes because, as an old-ophyte, you start to forget how this stuff sounds to neophytes.

I really don't want this just to be about insight and analysis - in fact, I'd probably prefer it if it was mostly about how it makes you feel. In the first instance, anyway: that could easily lead to exploration of how the music works to lead to whatever effect it has.

Ok, cool. I'll have another listen or two and try and give some neophyte impressions tomorrow.

Andy C wrote:
I really don't want this just to be about insight and analysis - in fact, I'd probably prefer it if it was mostly about how it makes you feel. In the first instance, anyway: that could easily lead to exploration of how the music works to lead to whatever effect it has.

Yeah, I wanted to say that, but I kind of felt "Andy's gaff, Andy's rules", so I'm glad you did. I certainly lack the knowledge to spot (say) what's unusual about a theme and variations compared to the general run of themes and variations, and the vocabulary to talk about it if I do spot it. I was a bit worried that the puny contributions of us keen but undereducated types would have to be squeezed into the interstices.

Okay, sorry, I'll back off on the analytical impulse.

No! Bruno, I really didn't want that to come across as any sort of wish to curtail what you've been bringing to this. It's already been hugely valuable and it's perked up my listening astonishingly. Brilliant stuff, matey, and keep on doing it. I'm sure everybody values it immensely.

Basically, what I think I'm saying is let's all bring whatever we can to this, in whatever way we like. The point - if there is a point - is that classical music isn't the exclusive domain of the tutored aficionado and I want us all to contribute whatever we're able to help each other to the pleasures that lie within.

Okay, sorry, I'll come roaring back with the analytical impulse.

Thanks for the nice compliment. It's caused me to feel awkward and start shuffling.

I have it on order, but massively excited that there will be a bassline.

Bruno – analytical insight is good, more “classical buff discussing the Beatles” please. It’ll make up for lame jokes from me about hoping we get some Sherbet next time.

Anyway.

It's perhaps a little odd that we've started out with considerations of the finale, but I'm glad we have because I'm finding that it's the section of the symphony that's presenting the most problems for me. Not that it isn't thrilling to listen to - as a musical experience it's right up there with the first three movements. It's somehow that it's the part that fits least well in the company of the others, for me.

I think it's because I'm finding it easier to relate the first three movements to the "heroic" notion that, let's face it, is really impossible to escape. To me, the first movement is a manifesto and a call to arms - an appeal to everybody to bravely embrace progress for the new world that is possible if we do. And what makes it even more compelling is that it's an honest and realistic exposition of all this - the ride's going to be rough at times and there will be inevitable, immense setbacks (there's that astonishing chord that's miles away from the home key that appears out of nowhere about three-quarters of the way through and brings everything to a sudden stop - but even this is overcome).

The second movement, the funeral march, seems to start quite properly concerning itself with mortality, but seems to build on this to become more about legacy. To be horribly programmatic, it's like the first three minutes are a depiction of a great tree felled in the forest, and then the upper strings start to point out the new green shoots beginning to proceed from the stump. And the third is about the sheer joyous rush of the heroic mindset - even if there are a few stumbles (those near-arythmical downward interjections) along the way.

But the fourth movement, for me, doesn't engender that sort of inner response.

It'll be some time before I have a coherent response to Ludwig's 3rd I feel. The problem is that I have great trouble finding a satisfactory context to hear longer classical pieces. In the main I listen to music when I'm driving, cooking or doing other domestic chores, so it becomes ambient.* Conversely, if I sit down to listen intently I find my mind wandering. This is frustrating as it takes a long time before I manage to apprehend music of great complexity. It happens sometimes, sooner or later, but unpredictably — I've noticed choral music is more accessible to me for some reason.

* BTW There's nothing wrong with ambience and much music — modern or classical — seems to benefit from just that sort of listening approach, it's just that I suspect Beethoven (and I know Wagner) aren't good examples.

Back in the day if you wanted to hear Beethoven's Eroica at all, your only option was to go to a concert where the Eroica was being offered. (Unless you were so rich as to employ your own court musicians, that is.) It's hush and pay attention concert music, no getting around it. That said I have no problem only taking one movement at a time, or familiarizing myself with something by ambient osmosis.

I think we've become a nation/culture of wandering minds. There are too many distractions and life moves at a much faster pace than it did for Beethoven and his audience. But at least there's lots of music (classical and otherwise) that only need hold your attention for a few minutes.

Bruno wrote:
I think we've become a nation/culture of wandering minds. There are too many distractions and life moves at a much faster pace than it did for Beethoven and his audience. But at least there's lots of music (classical and otherwise) that only need hold your attention for a few minutes.

Don't forget several of us on this thread are fans of Test cricket...

OK, I've just finished listening to it. I'm afraid I didn't do it at one sitting, which makes it hard for me to get a handle on Andy's ideas about the relationship between the finale and the first three movements. I'll try to do that before too long though.

I love it. I think that in my inchoate, visceral kind of way, I can tell that it's a ground-breaking, rule-smashing piece. It feels unbound. I think it's always been a canard, I think, to say that earlier, Baroque and Classical, music was dry, precise, mathematical and emotionless. But where the Baroque and Classical composers played with and strained against conventions, Beethoven seems to sweep them away impatiently.

The fourth movement is probably my favourite. I'm not prepared to go to the stake for that though, because wonder whether on further listening and reflection I might decide that it occasionally slips into bombast--something you can't accuse the composer of in any of the other movements. I need to let it all percolate a bit.

I think who the conductor is can have a lot to do with the level of bombast in the 4th movement. Some people see the bombastic implications of Beethoven's music as something to relish, as that which makes him more real and human and less 'bloodless' than Mozart (an unfair dichotomy I agree); while others want to hear something more Olympian-Promethean, sort of a touch of noble restraint at the climaxes.

So the exuberant last bars of the 3rd (or the 9th) can be played with the proverbial reckless abandon or, if you will, instead with a supremely confident sense of inexorability, and you'll probably hear it both ways if you listen to enough different interpretations.

For what it's worth, I've been listening mostly to Roger Norrington, with a bit of one of the mp3s from that classiccat link as well.

I can't listen to classical music. Every time I hear some classical music I'm seven years old again, watching a trades test transmission in a cold, empty living room, hours before anyone else is up, waiting for Tales of the Riverbank to start.

Damn you, Anglia Television.